“I didn’t think—” Lincoln’s words died as Carter settled his jacket over his shoulders, heat of a different sort enveloping him. Leather, coffee, and fresh biscuits tickled Lincoln’s nose. “Thank you.”
Carter’s hands lingered on the collar, pulling the flaps of the jacket tight around Lincoln, and damn if Lincoln didn’t wish for Carter to pull a different direction. Closer, toward him. The slightest tug and Lincoln would go tumbling despite his better judgment. But right then, high on the victory of the first lead on the Dr. Fear case in years, he felt like diving. Deeper into those green eyes, into the dark curls the V-neck of his blue Henley teased at, into the heat everything about Carter Warren promised.
Carter pulled away instead, clearing his throat and standing. “We should get inside where it’s warm and see what else we can find.” He held his hand out to Lincoln, the silver band catching the afternoon sun. A miniature flame where seconds ago there had been a raging fire, one Lincoln had both feared and considered walking into. That was a first. As was Carter’s restraint. It surprised Lincoln more than he expected. Impressed him too.
He slid his hand into Carter’s. It wasn’t the heat he’d wanted but he’d take it. “Let’s go.”
Seven
Carter’s phone vibrated on the table, a new email notification lighting up the screen. He silenced the device and glanced up. If Lincoln had noticed, he didn’t acknowledge the disturbance, still speeding through slides on the reader.
Still wearing Carter’s jacket. And glasses now too, which only made him more sexy.
Smiling, Carter tapped at his phone screen, entering the passcode to access his personal email. His smile died at seeing the new email there. No luck, his contact at the state police reported. He thought back to what Larry had said this morning. About the family who’d died in a hit-and-run on the highway one bright summer afternoon three decades ago. He glanced again at Lincoln. If there was anyone who could help him . . . Or Lincoln might make a case example out of him. Or pity him. Or brush him off altogether. Carter didn’t think he could handle any of those outcomes, especially the last. He’d been brushed off enough times in life. He didn’t want to be brushed off by the guy he’d crushed on for eight years. And what would it say about Carter’s ability to contribute to their current case if he couldn’t solve the one that had stymied him the longest?
There was a knock against the workroom door, and the grad student Carter had met yesterday poked his head into the room. “I’m headed out.” He tilted his head, brow furrowed. “Hmm. I thought it would be more of a wreck in here than this.”
Lincoln rotated in his chair toward Jeremiah. “Oh, it was.”
“Hey!” Carter balled up a piece of scratch paper and threw it at him. “I was trying to help.”
Lincoln snatched the paper out of the air. “You helped by replacing those biscuits. Which reminds me, we need to go back by?—”
“No.” Carter stood and strode to the end of the table nearest Lincoln. “You cannot eat at Flour Power three times a day.”
“Personally, I beg to differ,” Jeremiah interrupted, and they both swung their gazes to their forgotten audience, who was rocking back on his heels, thumbs hooked in his suspenders. “Been going to FP all my life, and three times a day is not unheard of, but you two can argue out your own boundaries. I’m going to see myself out of this domestic.”
Chalk it up to selling the cover, which Carter was about to possibly undercut with his next move, but he needed proof to back up a theory he was noodling, one that had niggled at the back of his mind since the police station and had grown louder at Jeremiah’s “all my life” remark. He crossed the room to Jeremiah and laid his right hand on Jeremiah’s shoulder. “Thanks for helping L get set up today.”
“Sure thing.” Jeremiah smiled and dipped his chin, long lashes fluttering. Distracted just long enough for Carter to get what he needed. And thankfully before Lincoln, behind them, cleared his throat. Carter fought not to smile at what that grunt might mean. For his part, Jeremiah dropped the coy act and stepped out from under Carter’s hand. “I won’t be in tomorrow. Last day off before students are officially back. You two should get out of here too. Take some time around town before it gets flooded with students. Visit FP once more while you can still get a table.”
“Don’t encourage him,” Carter said.
A ball of paper hit the back of his head.
Jeremiah laughed all the way out of the archives room and down the hall to the elevator, the sound fading as the mechanical doors whooshed shut. Carter had waited to be sure.
“His ass is long since gone,” Lincoln sniped behind him. “You can stop staring after him now.”
Definitely jealous, and Carter didn’t bother to hide his smile as he sauntered back across the room to where Lincoln now stood. “Not his ass I was interested in.” He flicked at one of the curls tickling his own forehead.
Lincoln cocked a brow. “Baby silver fox fantasies?”
His brow inched higher as Carter continued to draw closer, only stopping when there was less than a foot left between them. “I prefer actual silver foxes.” He lifted his left hand and wove his fingers through the ends of Lincoln’s hair.
Lincoln’s breath hitched and his gaze dropped to Carter’s mouth. Fuck, Carter loathed interrupting this moment, where he was sure it was headed, same as he’d loathed interrupting the one outside, but it wasn’t only his conscience holding him back this time. It was the matter of the hair in his closed right fist and the one he needed to grab with the left. He closed his thumb and index finger around a silver strand and yanked.
Lincoln howled and staggered backward. “What the fuck was that?”
“Get the evidence bags out of my coat pocket.”
“Evidence bags?”
“Yes, I always keep a few in the inner pocket.”
“For what?” Lincoln asked as he dug out the plastic bags.
Carter held his two fists out in front of him and turned them over. He opened the left one, cupped. “Your gray hair is a control.” Then he did the same with the right one. “Jeremiah’s gray hair is the variable.”
